The King Of The Mountains Part 22

I seized the King's hand; it was cold. His features were convulsed; his marble-like face became a frightful color. At this sight, my strength suddenly failed me, and I felt that I was dying. I had nothing more to hope for in the world; had I not condemned myself, in killing the only man who had any interest in saving me? My head fell on my breast, and I sat, helpless, by the side of the livid and shivering old man.

Moustakas and some of the others had, already, stretched out their hands to seize me and compel me to share their sufferings. Hadgi-Stavros had no strength to defend me. Occasionally, a terrible hiccough shook the King, as the wood-cutter's ax shakes an oak a hundred years old. The bandits were persuaded that he was dying, and that the invincible old man was about, at last, to be conquered by death. All the ties which bound them to their chief, bonds of interest, of fear, of hope, and of grat.i.tude, broke like the threads of a spider's web. The Greeks are the most restive people in the world. Their inordinate and intemperate vanity was sometimes subdued, but like a steel ready to rebound. They knew how, in case of need, to lean upon the strongest, or how to modestly follow the lead of the ablest, but not how to pardon the master who had protected and enriched them. For thirty centuries or more, this nation has been composed of a people, egotistical and jealous, which only necessity has held together, which inclination separates, and which no human power could unite entirely.

Hadgi-Stavros learned to his cost that one does not command, with impunity, sixty Greeks. His authority did not survive an instant longer than his moral force or his physical vigor. Without mentioning the wounded men who shook their fists in our faces, while reproaching us for their sufferings, the able-bodied grouped themselves in front of their legitimate king, around a huge, brutal peasant, named Coltzida. He was the most garrulous and most shameless of the band, an impudent blockhead without talent and without courage; one of those who hide during action, and who carry the flag after a victory; but in like situations, fortune favors impudent braggarts. Coltzida, proud of his lungs, heaped insults, by the score, on Hadgi-Stavros, as a grave-digger heaps the earth on the grave of a dead man.

"Thou seest," he said, "a wise man, an invincible general, an all-powerful king, and invulnerable mortal! Thou hast not deserved thy glory, and we have been far-sighted in trusting ourselves to thee! What have we gained in thy company? How hast thou served us? Thou hast given us fifty-four miserable francs a month, a beggarly pittance. Thou hast fed us on black bread and mouldy cheese which you would not touch, while thou hast acc.u.mulated a fortune and sent ships loaded with gold to foreign bankers. What benefit have we received from our victories and for all the blood which we have shed in the mountains? Nothing! thou hast kept all for thyself, spoils, personal effects, prisoners' ransoms!

It is true that thou hast left us the bayonet thrusts: it is the only profit of which thou hast not taken thy share. During the two years I have been with thee, I have received four wounds in the back, and thou hast not a scar to show! If, at least, thou hadst known how to lead us!

If thou hadst chosen good opportunities, when there was little to risk and much to gain! Thou hast beaten us; thou hast been our executioner; thou hast sent us into the wolves' jaws! Thou hast then hastened to be done with us and to retire us on a pension! Thou wert longing so much to see us all buried near Vasile that thou deliveredst us to this cursed lord, who has thrown a spell over our bravest soldiers! But do not hope to cheat us from our vengeance. I know why thou wishest to have him go away; he has paid his ransom. But what dost thou wish to do with this money? Wilt thou carry it away to a foreign country? Thou art sick, opportunely, my poor Hadgi-Stavros. Milord has not spared thee, thou art dying also, and it is well! My friends, we are our own masters. We will no longer obey anyone, we will do whatever pleases us, we will eat the best, we will drink all of the wine of Aegina, we will burn an entire forest to cook whole herds, we will pillage the kingdom! we will take Athens and we will camp in the Palace gardens! You have only to allow yourselves to be led; I know the best methods! Let us begin by throwing the old man, with his much loved lord, into the ravine; I will then tell you what is necessary to do!"

Coltzida's eloquence came near costing us our lives, because his audience applauded. Hadgi-Stavros' old comrades, ten or a dozen devoted Palikars, who might have come to his aid, had eaten dessert at his table: they were also writhing in agony. But a popular orator cannot elevate himself above his fellows without creating jealousies. When it became clear that Coltzida proposed to become chief of the band, Tambouris and some other ambitious ones faced about and ranged themselves on our side. To a man they liked better the man who knew how to lead them than this insolent braggart, whose incapacity repelled them. They urged that the King had not long to live, and that he would appoint his successor from among the faithful who remained around him.

It was no ordinary affair. The odds were that the capitalists would more readily ratify Hadgi-Stavros' choice, than endorse a revolutionary election. Eight or ten voices were raised in our defense. Ours, because our interests were one. I clung to the King of the Mountains, and he had one arm around my neck. Tambouris and his fellows put their heads together; a plan of defense was formed; three men profited by the uproar to run, with Dimitri, to the a.r.s.enal, to get arms and cartridges, and to lay along the path a train of powder. They came back and discreetly mixed with the crowd. They formed into two parties; insults were hurled from one to the other. Our champions, with their backs to Mary-Ann's chamber, guarded the staircase, they made a rampart of their bodies for us, and kept the enemy in the King's cabinet. In the scrimmage, a pistol-shot rung out. A ribbon of fire ran over the ground and the rock flew up with a fearful noise.

Coltzida and his followers, surprised by the detonation, ran to the a.r.s.enal. Tambouris lost not an instant; he raised Hadgi-Stavros, descended the staircase in two bounds, laid him in a safe place, returned, picked me up, carried, and laid me at the King's feet. Our friends intrenched themselves in the chamber, cut trees, barricaded the staircase, and organized a defense before Coltzida could return.

Then, we counted our forces. Our army was composed of the King, his two servants, Tambouris with eight brigands, Dimitri, and myself; in all fourteen men, of whom three were disabled. The coffee-bearer had been poisoned also, and he began to show the first rigors of illness. But we had two guns apiece, and a great supply of cartridges, while the enemy had no arms nor ammunition except what they carried on their persons.

They possessed the advantage of numbers and point of vantage. We did not know exactly how many able-bodied men they had, but we must expect to meet twenty-five or thirty a.s.sailants. I need not describe to you the place of siege: you know it. Believe, however, that the aspect of the place had changed a great deal since the day when I breakfasted there for the first time, under guard of the Corfuan, with Mrs. Simons and Mary-Ann. The roots of our beautiful trees were exposed, and the nightingale was far away. What is more important for you to know, is, that we were protected on the right and left by rocks, inaccessible even to the enemy. They could attack us from the King's cabinet, and they could watch us from the bottom of the ravine. On the one hand, their b.a.l.l.s flew over us; on the other, ours flew over the sentinels, but at such long range that it was wasting our ammunition.

If Coltzida and his companions had possessed the least idea of war, they could have done for us. They could have raised the barricade, entered by force, driven us into a corner, or thrown us over into the ravine. But the imbecile, who had two men to our one, thought to husband his ammunition, and place, as sharp-shooters, twenty stupid men who did not know how to discharge a gun. Our men were not much more skillful. Better commanded, however, and wiser, they managed to smash five heads before night fell. The combatants knew each other by name. They called to each other after the fashion of Homer's heroes. One attempted to convert the other by aiming at his cheek; the other replied by a ball and by argument. The combat was only an armed discussion when, from time to time, the muskets spoke.

As for me, stretched out in a corner, sheltered from the b.a.l.l.s, I tried to undo my fatal work, and to recall the poor King of the Mountains to life. He suffered cruelly; he complained of great thirst, and a sharp pain in the upper part of the abdomen. His icy hands and feet were violently convulsed. The pulse was irregular, the respiration labored.

His stomach seemed to struggle against an internal execution, without being able to expel it. His mind had lost nothing of its vigor and its quickness; his bright and keen eye searched the horizon in the direction of the Bay of Salamis, and Photini's floating prison.

He grasped my hand and said: "Cure me, my dear child! You are a doctor, you ought to cure me. I will not reproach you with what you have done; you were right; you had reason to kill me, because I swore that without your friend Harris I would not have allowed you to escape me. Is there nothing to quench the fire which consumes me? I care nothing for life; I have lived long enough; but if I die, they will kill you, and my poor Photini will be sacrificed. I suffer! Feel my hands; it seems to me that they are already dead. Do you believe that this American will have the heart to carry out his threats? What was it you told me a little while ago? Photini loves him! Poor little one! I have brought her up to become the wife of a king. I would rather see her dead, than--no, I would rather, after all, that she should love this young man; perhaps he may take pity on her. What are you to him? a friend; nothing more; you are not even a compatriot. One may have as many friends as one wishes; one cannot find two women like Photini; I would strangle all my friends if I found it to my advantage; I would never kill a woman who loved me. If only he knew how rich she is! Americans are practical, at least, so it is said. But the poor, little innocent knows nothing about her fortune.

I ought to have told her. But how can I let him know that she will have a dowry of four millions? We are Coltzida's prisoners. Cure me then, and by all the saints in paradise I will crush the reptile!"

I am not a physician, and all I know about toxicology is in its elementary treatment; I remembered, however, that a.r.s.enical poisoning was cured only by a method similar to "Doctor Sangrado." I used means to make the old man eject the contents of his stomach, and I soon began to hope that the poison was almost expelled. Reaction followed; his skin became burning hot, the pulse quickened, his face flushed, his eyes were blood-shot. I asked him if any one of his men knew enough to bleed him.

He tied a bandage tightly around his arm, and coolly opened a vein himself, to the noise of the fusilade and while the bullets dashed around him. He let out a sufficient amount of blood, and asked me in a sweet and tranquil tone, what else there was to do. I ordered him to drink, to drink more, to keep on drinking, until the last particle of a.r.s.enic had been disposed of. The goat-skin of white wine which had killed Vasile was still in the chamber. This wine, mixed with water, brought back life to the King. He obeyed me like a child. I believe that the first time I held out the cup to him, his poor, old suffering Highness seized my hand to kiss it.

Toward ten o'clock he became much better, but his pipe-bearer was dead.

The poor devil could neither rid himself of the poison, nor revive. They threw him into the ravine, at the top of the cascade. All our defenders were in good condition, without a wound, but famished as wolves in December. As for me, I had been without food for twenty-four hours, and I was very hungry. The enemy, in order to defy us, pa.s.sed the night eating and drinking above our heads. They threw to us some mutton bones and some empty goat-skin bottles. Our men replied with some shots, guessing at the position of our foes. We could plainly hear the cries of joy and the groans of the dying. Coltzida was drunk; the wounded and the sick howled in unison; Moustakas did not shout for a long time. The tumult kept me awake the entire night near the old King. Ah! Monsieur, how long the nights seem to him who is not sure of the next day!

Tuesday morning broke gray and wet. The sky looked threatening at sunrise, and a disagreeable rain fell alike on friend and foe. But if we were wide awake enough to protect our arms and ammunition, General Coltzida's army had not taken the same precaution. The first engagement redounded entirely to our honor. The enemy was badly hidden, and fired their pistols with shaking hands. The game seemed so good a one, that I took a gun like the others. What happened I will write to you about at some future time, if I ever become a doctor. I have already confessed to murders enough for a man whose business it is not. Hadgi-Stavros followed my example; but his hands refused to act; his extremities were swollen and painful, and I announced to him, with my usual frankness, that this incapacity might last as long as he did.

About nine o'clock the enemy, who seemed to be very attentive in responding to us, suddenly turned their backs. I heard heavy firing which was not directed to us, and I concluded that Master Coltzida had allowed himself to be surprised in the rear. Who was the unknown ally who was serving us so good a turn? Was it prudent to effect a junction and to demolish our barricade? I asked nothing else, but the King believed that it was a troop of the line, and Tambouris gnawed his moustache. All our doubts were soon removed. A voice which was not unknown to me, cried: "All right!" Three young men, armed to the teeth, sprang forward like tigers, broke down the barricade and fell in our midst. Harris and Lobster held in each hand a six-shooter. Giacomo brandished a musket, the b.u.t.t-end in the air, like a club: it was thus that he knew how to use fire-arms.

A thunder-bolt falling into the chamber would have produced less magical effect than the appearance of these men, who shot right and left, and who seemed to carry death in their hands. My three fellow-boarders, excited by the noise, elated with victory, perceived neither Hadgi-Stavros nor me. They only turned around in order to kill a man, and G.o.d knows! they did their work well. Our poor champions, astonished, affrighted, were overcome without having had time to defend themselves or to be recognized. I, who would have saved their lives, shouted from my corner; but my voice was drowned in the whistling of bullets, and the shouts of the conquerors. Dimitri, crouching between the King and me, vainly joined his voice to mine. Harris, Lobster, and Giacomo fired, ran here and there, knocked down, counting the blows, each in his own tongue.

"One!" said Lobster.

"Two!" responded Harris.

"Tre! quatro! cinque!" growled Giacomo. The fifth was Tambouris. His head split under the blow like a fresh nut struck by a stone. The brains were scattered about, and the body sunk into the water like a bundle of clothes which a washerwoman throws in the edge of a brook. My friends were a fine sight in their horrible work. They killed with ferocity, they delighted in the justice they meted out. While running toward the camp, the wind had blown away their hats; their locks were disheveled; their glistening eyes shone so murderously, that it was difficult to decide whether death was dealt by their looks or by their hands. One could have said that destruction was incarnate in this panting trio.

When they had removed all obstacles from their path and they saw no enemies but the three or four wounded men stretched on the ground, they stopped to breathe. Harris' first thought was for me. Giacomo had only one care: he wished to ascertain whether, among the number, he had broken Hadgi-Stavros' head. Harris shouted: "Hermann, where are you?"

"Here!" I replied: and the three fighters ran at my call.

The King of the Mountains, feeble as he was, put one hand on my shoulder, raised himself from the rock, looked fixedly at these men who had killed such a number to reach him, and said in a firm tone: "I am Hadgi-Stavros!"

You know that my friends had waited for a long time for occasion to chastise the old Palikar. They had promised themselves to celebrate his death as a festival. They would avenge Mistra's little daughters; a thousand other victims; me, and themselves. But, however, I had no need to restrain them. There was such remains of greatness in this hero in ruins, that their anger fell from them and gave way to astonishment.

They were all three young men, and at the age when one no longer takes arms against a disarmed enemy. I related to them, in a few words, how the King had defended me against his whole band, almost dead as he was, and on the same day on which I had poisoned him. I explained to them about the battle they had interrupted, the barricades they had broken down, and that strange contest in which they had interfered and killed our defenders.

"So much the worse for them!" said John Harris. "We wear, like Justice, a bandage over our eyes. If the rogues performed a good deed before they died, it will be counted in their favor up above; I do not object to it."

"As for the men of whom we have deprived you, do not worry about them,"

said Lobster. "With two revolvers in our hands and two more in our pockets, we have each been worth twenty-four men. We have killed these; the others have only to come back. Is it not so, Giacomo?"

"As for me, I could knock down an army of bulls!" said the Maltese; "I am in the humor for it. And to think that one is reduced to sealing letters with two such fists as these!"

The enemy, however, recovered from their astonishment, had again begun the siege. Three or four brigands had poked their noses over our ramparts and saw the carnage. Coltzida knew not what to think of the three scourges who had struck blindly, right and left, among friends and foes; but he decided that either sword or poison must have freed the King of the Mountains. He prudently ordered the men to demolish our defense. We were out of sight, sheltered by the wall, about ten steps from the staircase. The noise of the falling barricade warned my friends to reload their revolvers. The King allowed them to do so. He said to John Harris:

"Where is Photini?"

"On my ship."

"You have not harmed her?"

"Do you think that I have taken lessons from you in torturing young girls?"

"You are right, I am a miserable old dog; pardon me! Promise me to forgive her!"

"What the devil do you want me to do with her? Now that I have found Hermann, I will send her back to you whenever you wish."

"Without ransom?"

"You old beast!"

"You shall see whether I am an old beast!"

He pa.s.sed his left arm around Dimitri's neck, he extended his shriveled and trembling hand toward the hilt of his sword, painfully drew the blade from the scabbard, and marched toward the staircase where Coltzida and his men stood hesitating. They recoiled at sight of him, as if the earth had opened to allow the pa.s.sage of the ruler of the infernal regions. There were fifteen or twenty, all armed; not one dared to defend himself, to make excuses, nor even to attempt to escape. They trembled in all their limbs, at sight of the terrible face of the resuscitated King. Hadgi-Stavros marched straight to Coltzida, who, paler and more horrified than the others, attempted to hide behind his companions. The King threw his arm backwards by an effort impossible to describe, and with one blow severed his head from his body. Instantly, a trembling seized him. His sword fell on the dead man and he did not deign to pick it up.

"Let us go on," he said, "I carry an empty scabbard. The blade is no longer of use, neither am I; I am done for!"

His old companions approached to ask pardon. Some of them begged him not to abandon them; they knew not what to do without him. He did not honor them with a word of response. He implored us to accompany him to Castia to find horses, and to Salamis to search for Photini.

The brigands allowed us to depart without hindrance. After a few steps, my friends noticed that I could scarcely step; Giacomo helped me along; Harris asked if I was wounded. The King gave me a beseeching look, poor man! I told my friends that I had attempted a perilous escape, and that my feet had been badly wounded. We carefully picked our way down the mountain paths. The groans of the wounded, and the voices of the bandits who were discussing matters, followed us for quite a distance. As we approached the village, the weather changed, and the path began to dry under our feet. The first ray of sunlight which burst forth seemed to me very beautiful. Hadgi-Stavros paid little attention to the outside world; he communed within himself. It is something to break off a habit of fifty years standing.

On the outskirts of Castia, we met the monk who was carrying a swarm of bees in a sack. He greeted us courteously, and excused himself for not having visited us since the evening before. The musket shots had intimidated him. The King saluted him and pa.s.sed on. My friends' horses were waiting, with their guide, near the fountain. I asked them how they happened to have four horses. They said that M. Merinay made one of the party, but that he had alighted to inspect a curious stone, and that he had not yet re-appeared.

Giacomo Fondi lifted me to the saddle at arm's length; he could not resist the temptation. The King, a.s.sisted by Dimitri, painfully climbed into his. Harris and his nephew vaulted into theirs; Giacomo, Dimitri, and the guide preceded us on foot.

The path widening, I rode up beside Harris, and he related to me how the King's daughter had fallen into his hands:

"Imagine;" he said to me. "I had just arrived from my cruise, much pleased with myself, and very proud of having run down a half-dozen pirates. I anch.o.r.ed off Piraeus, Sunday, at six o'clock; I landed; and as I had been eight days tete-a-tete with my head officer, I promised myself a little pleasure in conversation. I stopped a fiacre, I hired it for the evening. I arrived at Christodule's house in the midst of a general hubbub; I would never have believed that so much trouble could be found in a pastry-cook's house. Every one was there for supper.

Christodule, Maroula, Dimitri, Giacomo, William, M. Merinay and the little Sunday girl, more tricked out than ever. William related to me your story. It is useless to tell you that I made a great uproar. I was furious with myself for not having been in the city. My nephew a.s.sured me that he had done all he could. He had scoured the city for fifteen thousand francs, but his parents had opened only a limited credit for him; briefly, he had not found the amount. In despair, he addressed himself to M. Merinay: but the sweet Merinay pretended that all his money was lent to his intimate friends, far from here, very far;--farther than the end of the world!

"'Eh! Zounds!' I said to Lobster, 'it is in lead-money that one must pay the old scoundrel. For what good is it to be as dextrous as Nimrod, if one's talent is good only to break Socrates' prison? We must organize a hunt for the old Palikars! Once, I refused a journey to Central Africa: I have since regretted it. It is double pleasure to shoot an animal which defends itself. Provide plenty of powder and b.a.l.l.s, and to-morrow morning we will set out on a campaign.' William took the bait, Giacomo brought his fist down in a crashing blow on the table; you know what Giacomo's fist-blows are. He swore that he would accompany us, provided he could find a single-barreled gun. But the most enraged of all was M.

Merinay. He wished to bathe his hands in the blood of those wretches. We accepted his services, but I offered to buy the game which he would bring back. He swelled out his little voice in the most comical fashion, and showing his fists to Mademoiselle, said that Hadgi-Stavros would have business to settle with him.